Whether You Know it Or Not
by contrecoup
Summary: The Once-ler is moving out of his Lerkim, and Ted and Grandma Norma come to help for the day. Hoarding doesn't even begin to cover the collection he's amassed over the years. The reminiscing starts a' flowin, especially when they find some of the memories Once-ler hid from himself when he locked himself away. Some serious Normaler hintage.
1. Old Limbs

Lil note for all you Normaler fans out there - in this story, Ted isn't their grandchild. They do have a history, just...yeah - no kid. Just thought I'd put that out there so as not to confuse anybody.

Sorry, sorry - alright, continue.

-

Though the Truffala sprouts, a collective, it seemed, by the way that they grew, came almost up to your knee when you walked amongst their stalks, the wind still blew heavy with the smell of soured butterfly milk and lingering smog. You still couldn't go out too long in the rain. Every time the air hissed with the sound of heavy black droplets, the Once-ler and Lorax had to scramble to spread tarps out over the smaller sprouts, fearful they'd damage or, worse, die out in the fields.

They were seeing more swammy swans though. More and more each day.

It was getting better, the Once-ler smiled, staring up when the shadow of one cooled his neck passing above his front porch. He let out the sigh squeezing deep in his chest. Finally, it was getting better.

The honk of horn, close and disconcertingly loud, jarred him from his thoughts.

"You're gonna kill that cactus if you keep watering it like that!" Came the sound of Norma shouting over the sputtering kick of her car.

"Gah!" he fumbled with the watering can, almost dropping it when he jumped. Sure enough, a murky pool was now floating up to the rim of his cactus pot. He chuckled nervously and tipped it over the railing, knocking the side of the pot so that soggy flecks of dirt flew out.

"Nah, it'd take more than a little water to kill these guys. They've been with me this long after all." He called back. And it was true. His cacti were the only things hardy enough to muscle through the smogulous smoke that hung, thinner now, over his Lerkim. One could say they practically thrived in it. He furrowed his brow for a moment at that thought – he'd never thought to worry if they'd have trouble surviving in the new cleaner environment. He hoped not - he was rather fond of them after all. He'd even gone so far as to name a few, like the one he currently held in his hands as he set it gingerly back down on the porch.

Melvin…

His favorite…

It was the sound of Norma's voice again that shook him from his thoughts. She always did have that habit, he smiled.

"You going to make an old woman carry all these boxes in?" she hollered with a laugh in her voice.

Once-ler stowed his watering can on the steps and moseyed over to the car. "Now that's not fair! You can't play the age card, now, I'm just as old as you!"

Today was moving day. The Lorax had sat him down a few weeks ago and confided, very earnestly, that he was worried about him staying out here by himself. There was no reason to keep punishing himself, he'd explained – the Truffala trees were growing bigger and stronger each day. What damage he'd done was being repaired, finally, after all these years. He could live his own life now if he chose, and the Lorax, with all the sincerity of a true friend, told him he wanted to see him chose to live for himself, after decades of wallowing in regret over his life.

The Once-ler had been touched, sincerely touched, to know that someone, anyone, wanted that for him; he'd even given the Lorax a hug, though he knew he wasn't too fond of them. It worked out perfectly too, since the Lorax was setting off for a while to search beyond the valley, eager to find any animals that were willing to come back. Norma's daughter had been nice enough to offer him a stay at their home while he looked for a house in Thneedville, so all that was left was to clean house, and Norma and Ted were more than willing to help him.

Ted hopped out of the car first, rubbing tiny, pained circles into the back of his next. "I'm glad I won't have to make THAT trip too many more times," he muttered, more to himself, and cracked his back.

Once-ler ambled towards him and, with a warm smile, patted the square of his back.

"Well at least you got a better pair of wheels this time than that scooter. Now tell me, where in all of Thneedville did you guys steal this hot rod from?"

It reminded him of those race cars his uncle used to watch zipping around in circles on TV when he was a kid. The thing was bright red, just like the race cars, and even had a stripe racing down it. Preposterously large wind breakers commanded your view of the back. Though he scoffed at the car's size - entirely unnecessary, he grumbled - he secretly marveled at its design. He was amazed at how quickly things had changed since the last car he'd seen – this thing was so much slicker, so much rounder, and, perhaps most importantly, there wasn't a crank to start her up. It made him dizzy just thinking how fast it could go.

He sniffed. "I'd say it's too much car to handle, but then again, I know the little lady who's driving…"

She was scurrying down the stack of phone books loaded up in her seat so that she could reach the wheel. Planting both feet on the upholstery, she jumped with such finesse the few feet to the ground she didn't even drop her summer hat, a big bright green thing, with a white ribbon around it.

"Oh, Helen let me take this little baby out for a spin. She figured Ted's scooter wouldn't do too well as a moving van." She said, poking him playfully with her cane. "We still brought it along though. Maybe Ted here can teach ya how to ride it."

Both Ted and the Once-ler quickly held up their palms and waved the suggestion away, stammering "No, no, that's ok."When they noticed the other's mirrored reaction, they shared a shy smile.

"I'm quite alright where I am, Norma," the Once-ler asserted, "with both my feet firmly on the ground. Stop trying to coax me into one of those…those…slick roadster whatsits…"

"They're called scooters, dear," she called, her face hidden behind boxes now that she'd taken them out of the back seat.

"I know what a scooter is. That…do-hickey Ted zips by on isn't one." He grunted, the wind swept out of him - oof, when she tossed her load unceremoniously into his outstretched arms. He even stumbled back a bit from the weight. Good lord, he thought, it was hard to believe he'd grown THIS feeble. She loaded Ted up too, until both of them could barely see where they were going.

"Alright, boys, lets get to work. Nothing's ever gotten done by standing around!" She marched on ahead, an inexplicably formidable force despite her short-stature and cane. Knowing better than to argue, her two boys shuffled after her, tripping up the stairs.

—

They stumbled into the ill-light of his living room, stuffy and windowless, though it was shining bright with midday just outside. The Once-ler jimmied the light switch on with a shuffling elbow. Better. But not by much.

The room had the odd quality of seeming sparse and cluttered at same time, or so Ted thought – it was his first time ever setting foot in the Lerkim. Practically everything within it, even the picture frames, was worn beyond redemption. There was very little furniture, no coffee table and barely any chairs, but there were shelves, plenty of shelves, and Ted found the majority of his attention drawn to studying them.

Sprinkled along their ranks was a completely random assortment (to his eye) of old light bulbs, clouded with disuse, arranged eerily in perfect single file line, along with, among other things, scatterings of tea cups, spoons, utensils Ted had never even seen before, crayons and drawing supplies, a few books, one or two monstrously bigger than the other, a flapping tongue old boots, some kind of turkey baster, guitar strings, and – to him at least, the most inexplicable - a single ski.

Ted dumped his boxes to the floor and stared out at the hoard's entirety.

"Why…?" he couldn't manage to get the question out, and resorted to pointing.

The Once-ler chuckled, "Well I can't just have shelves with nothing on them!" He waddled over and dropped his boxes on the single large item of furniture in the room, a faded coach that, judging by the stains, might have been plaid green at some point. The grating squeak of springs welcomed its burden. He turned to see Ted reaching up to tug at the ceiling fan cord.

"Wait – don't do that!" Click.

As the blades began to spin, marbles rolled off in all directions from on top of the blades, clinking hard when they collided with the wood floor and rolling off to hide inconveniently beneath furniture and end tables and nestle hidden in corners.

"Darn it, and I worked so hard to get them to stay…" He gave a frustrated snap and scratched at his chin. Utterly confused, Ted was at a loss as to what to say, but sorry seemed vaguely appropriate.

The Once-ler waved him away. "Naaaah, it's was just a little invention I had in the works. But I guess it doesn't matter not that I'll be leaving here soon anyway. Not like I can take the ceiling fan with me, hmmhmm" He gave that odd little laugh that Ted thought made him seem a lot younger than he actually was. "Anyway, lets see…Norma, you seem to be the one in charge here. Where do you want us to start?"

"Oh, am I now?" She hid her cheek in her hand,pretending to be abashed. The news was far from new to her. "Well, if you say so…Ted!" She cracked her cane loudly against her palm. He snapped to attention.

"Yes ma'am!" his voice cracked.

"I want you in the kitchen! If it isn't expired, nailed down, or, for god's sake, breathing, I want it in a box, labeled, and sealed up – is that clear?"

"Yes ma'am!" he repeated. Turning quickly on his heel, he scooped up a few boxes and stomped off down the hall to the kitchen. Once-ler watched him, slightly in wonder.

"Oncie!" she turned her attention on him next. He gulped, and found himself imitating Ted.

"Your mission is to head upstairs to your room and pack away any and all clothes that you ever expect to wear again. Everything that isn't in a box in one hour is going in the trash. Do you accept?"

He was trying hard not to laugh. He'd always loved that cute little serious face of hers, the way her lip pouted and her brow would grow stern. He smiled in spite of himself.

"Norma, please, is this really necessary-"

She yanked him down by his thneed before he could finish."Do you accept?"

He yelped an affirmation and hurriedly started up the stairs, barely remembering to grab some boxes beforehand.

She hummed to herself once they were both gone. Men, she smiled, it didn't matter what age. They were all the same~.

Still humming, she set her hat on the end table, dusting it off first of course (it didn't look dirty, but she wasn't taking any chances in this house). Though she'd intended to start tidying up without another moment's pause, she stopped in mid-motion, her eyes caught by an object across the room. Oh, she gasped – now there was something…


	2. Even Older Memories

Once-ler's bedroom decorating design followed a similar vein as downstairs. Littering the walls were looping shelves densely packed with spools, missing piano keys, and an assortment of sheet music stacked high into terrifying towers. What seemed like a single ribbon, but was actually several tied into one long winding string, drooped in arches draping around room. Nothing lay on his bed, though – never his bed. No, he always made that impeccably, every morning, even smoothing out the wrinkles until it was perfect.

In a few places on the walls, the shelves were missing; you could still tell where'd they been by the mis-colored paint (and the piles of mis-matchings beneath them where their contents had been allowed to collapse). Without anymore Truffala trees, he'd needed ___something_ to board up his window with all those years ago. It'd seemed logical at the time, he shrugged.

Never did get curtains for the blasted thing, he grumbled. It was terrible when it rained.

Sitting on the table next to his bed, propping up books, lay a shiny tin can threateningly filled to the brim with nails. All kinds – shiny, bent, rusting, it didn't matter. He smiled at it, thinking of all the people who'd come to see him.

"I don't hear working up there!" A playful voice called up from below. He stammered - But how could she-

"Your floor squeaks something awful!" She called up again as if in answer to his question.

He smiled, a warm feeling melted within him, but he made sure to scurry over to his dresser before he let himself get swept away by his reminiscing again.

Norma was some kind of woman. Always had been.

He opened the first drawer and gave it a quick scan. Socks. Without bothering to sort through them, he dumped the whole contents of the drawer in a box.

Especially back in the day, her continued wistfully, when her hair floated down past her shoulders and she always carried that keen glint in her eye. And she always wore those short little summer dresses that shimmered like satin against her skin. They'd almost been too short…well, he gave a low whistle, opening the next drawer, ___short enough_.

She certainly was a looker, but damn any man who thought they could tame her. The girl was ten times feistier than she was beautiful.

More socks when he opened the third drawer. How many dang socks did he have? He chewed on his lip, debating what to do with them. He tossed the lot in a box anyway; it seemed a shame to let them go to waste.

He began to hear music drifting up from below, crisp and dry and unmistakeably cut from a gramophone. He knew the sound. He ought to, the thing was his…

Delighted sounds of triumph bubbled up scarcely after. "Oncie, you never told me you kept this ol' thing!" It was Norma's voice.

He chuckled and scooped up a few socks off the floor, bending down. "Looks like I didn't have to."

His back cracked when he stood, little pangs like piano keys splintering up his spine. He could hear the rhythmic creaks of movement coming from downstairs, and he had a hunch tickling at him that he knew what it was. Loading his arms with boxes, he began the treacherous journey back downstairs, each step a little prayer since he couldn't see his feet.

His weight wobbled beneath him onto the wood floor of his living room. Angling his head around the boxes,he caught his first glimpse of the scene before him… – and that warm, melty feeling overcame him once more.

There was Norma (___his Norma_, a little voice in the back of his mind piped up, but he waved the pesky thought way), armed with dust mop in hand, bouncing around the room in what he could only assume was dancing. Honestly it looked more like she had broken a heel, but he couldn't even laugh. She was making little sounds in time to the music, pausing every so often to give a swish of the dust mop to whatever item was in front of her, all the while bouncing her weight from foot to foot. A light tap. Boop. That one's done. And she'd start shuffling again, making more of those adorable sounds and boop, onto the next one. Swishing and swirling in a line down the shelf. Boop. Next one. Swish, bouncing her knee. Next one. The music dipped into a saucy two step. A little more hip in it this time around (___show 'um how it's done girl_, shh quiet, he started. Where was that voice coming from?).

"Your footwork's a little on the sloppy side," he said, biting his cheek. He hated to be the one to interrupt such a mesmerizing sight, but he was even more terrified of being unwittingly discovered watching her. She tossed him a wave, barely looking up.

"You're one to talk, Oncie! You've got two left feet and they'be both size 20!" she called out, and kept up her strange half-jig dance around the room.

Since her back was turned, he took a chance shaking his head. His attentions turned back to the burden in his arms, which was getting heavier by the minute. Since the coach was full of boxes now, he shuffled around trying to find another place to set them. It was by happy chance that Ted wandered in.

"Ted!" Once-ler struggled, nodding his head towards the door, "Could you and your young legs do this old man a favor and take these out to the car?"

Ted nodded but grunted when the weight was dropped into his arms. Once-ler held open the door so he could waddle out beneath them, the boxes stacked high, much taller than him.

"And be careful with those now! They're some of my most prized possession! Virtually irreplaceable!" He shouted, waggling a finger. He couldn't see Ted's face, but his posture straightened immediately, and his steps became more careful, inching forward.

Turning back to Norma, he sniggered. "I barely even know what's in those boxes."

Norma bopped him with the dust rag, scoffing. "You're terrible. Stop torturing my grandson. And after he was nice enough to come all the way out here just to help an old fart." She shot him a sly smile, her specialty, the kind that still sent shivers up to his ears and made it hard for him to think.

"Well now," he moved closer to pluck down a lamp she was struggling to reach,"I wonder just who he was talking about with that comment…"

Her jaw dropped in a laugh and she hit him again. "Are you calling me old?"

Bending down, sweetly holding out the lamp, he let his voice drop low. "…Like aged wine."

She snatched the lamp from him with a "Hmmph", mumbling quickly something about "…even so…shouldn't be talking to lady's that way…" He could only chuckle. Flustered. Damn if he was the only man ever could make Norma Wiggins flustered. From the way she held her face, almost imperceptibly angled away from him, he could tell she was fighting a battle against that tinging heat burning its way to her cheeks.

Ted returned to see Once-ler handing her the next top-shelf item, some kind of sculpture, twisted into some unrecognizable form with black and cracked clay.

Ted wrinkled his nose. "Wha-…why do you even have that?"He asked, his voice aghast.

The Once-ler knit his brow, briefly studying the thing.

"Well now, I don't rightly know. At least, not about this particularity. But I have a good guess where it came from. Here's a history lesson for ya, Ted - my house here used to be part of my old factory. When it started to close, anything that wasn't nailed down to the floor got scooped up and run off with. And all the leftovers nobody wanted, not even for free, ended up here."

"Good, that means you won't need it," Norma piped up, "so we can throw it away."

He sputtered, his eyes opening wideat the implication."N-now I didn't say that! I still like the stuff. It's still mine."

She pushed down her glasses to give him a wary glance, one that made him shift his feet, a new found abashment creeping over him. She made for a terrifying spotlight, even at only four feet tall.

"Well…maybe that one we can get rid of…" He gave a gulp, so dry it hurt. Almost sulkily, he took it over to the window and flung it out on the lawn, their temporary garbage pile.

–

Even under Grammy Norma's scrutiny, the pile grew pathetically slowly over the next few hours. Outside, their car, on the other hand, sagged dangerously close to the ground from the weight overloading its back seat.

Ted struggled fitting one last container in with the others - a box entirely filled with change jars. Why did he even need that?

He slammed into it with his back, rocking the car. "I…ugh…think…" he called out between assaults, grunting, "the…car's…just…about…FULL." He heard the tinkling crash of something breaking, and winced, hoping it wasn't anything serious. But hey, he figured, the box was in there now, right?

He waved it off (most of the boxes were full of what he considered junk anyway) and trudged back inside. It was only approaching midday, but already he was feeling exhausted.

He dragged his feet back inside and allowed himself a little sigh – at least the place looked almost empty now. And it was true – the chairs had been stacked and taken away, the missing-note shelves were almost bare now, stripped of their manic collections and crammed into boxes. Even the walls were bare now, most of their picture frames thrown into the garbage pile outside, though not without a fair bit of fuss from the Once-ler ("They're memories!" he'd argued, but Grammy would have none of it; "You don't even have pictures in them, these are the stock photographs still in them from the store!" "Yeah – and they're to remember when I bought them!").

The two had been bickering like that on and off all day. It never got serious, but it was enough to jar the moving process with their constant stopping and starting. "Maybe that's why I'm so tired," Ted wearily mused as he collapsed onto the one item of furniture still yet to be moved – the sofa. He wrinkled his nose, its ancient smell escaping in a puff up around where he sat. It rank of mothballs, and something else…something faintly sweet…pancake batter?

The Once-ler was saying something but Ted didn't bother to catch he turned to him expectantly, that is.

"Oh-uh w-what?" He scrambled to sit up. "Nothing else can fit in the car!"

Once-ler shook his head. "Tea, Ted. I was asking you and your grandmother if you would like some tea."

"O-oh….right, right. Uh sure, that sounds…delicious?" He eyed Grammy, unsure of how to respond. "I've never had tea before." He admitted, shrugging.

Once-ler gave a little clap. "We~ll you're in for a treat, then. Tea's good for you – makes you sprout up tall when you get older, like me. Since it'll be your first cup, I'll make you my specialty then – I hope you like it sweet!" He gave another clap and started quickly towards the kitchen, faster than Ted had seen him move all day.

He called out from around the corner, already messing about the stove. "How many lumps do you take it with, Norma? It's been so long I've forgotten."

"Two dear."

Ted heard him make a little "aha" noise followed by the clanging of pots and pans, the few that they'd still yet to pack.

Ted furrowed his brow. Wait a minute, he chewed at his lip, trying to figure out why what Once-ler had said wasn't sitting right with him…

He gasped when the answer rushed to him. "W-Wait – hold on a sec. You ___two_used to ___know_ each other? I mean that's what I'm getting right – I mean he said "it's been so long" and then you, I mean you acted like that was the truth, ya know…"

"Oh, why yes. But that was a long, long time ago, Ted." She made her way over to the coach and hopped up next to him, setting her cane across her lap. "Well now, I knew the Once-ler back before Thneedville was even a town."

"Back when Greenville was the only place for miles," Once-ler piped up, poking his head around the corner. He pointed a threatening pair of tongs at Ted. "If you think the trip to my lerkim is bad, it used to take me over 4 hours to get into town everyday. And that was by mule, mind you. Didn't have fancy-pants scooter back then to whip me around faster than I knew how to go." He disappeared back into the kitchen.

Ted rolled his eyes, a wary smile on his face. "Yeah, yeah and I bet the trip was uphill, both ways, and through three feet of snow…"

"No, no that was only a problem when the seasons chang-…" His voice trailed, and he stopped, sticking out his head. There were those tongs again. "…You're making fun of me aren't you?"

Ted innocently rolled his eyes towards the ceiling innocently. "So Grammy – how do you guys know each other?"He made a point to ignore Once-ler's narrow-eyed glare as he ducked back behind the corner.

She put a hand to her mouth, chuckling. "I threw a tomato at him."

"You ___what_?"

"Hurt like hell too," Once-ler laughed, coming out of the kitchen. In his arms was an old, slightly dingy yet ornate tea tray loaded with three mugs. He handed the first to Norma. "You're Grandma had quite an arm way back in the day."

"Still do!" She chuckled and hit him playfully in the arm, pulling her mug close to her and hugging its warmth in her hands.

Ted tore his gaze back and forth between the two of them, eyes wide. "B-But…but why did you..?" He barely realized he was taking the mug the Once-ler held out to him until he got a look inside it.

"What the – marshmallows?"

There was positively a mountain of them, piled so high he struggled to glimpse any of this "tea" he was supposed to be trying beneath their girth.

Once-ler stood (all the chairs had already been packed) and gave a laugh into his own mountain of marshmallows already at his lips.

"They're the perfect food for any occasion." He stated proudly.

Ted scoffed and turned to catch how Grammy was responding to this. She was humming to herself, swinging her feet of the edge of the coach and happily sipping at her (discernibly marshmallow-less) tea, completely unfazed.

"I-I'll just let mine cool," Ted forced a smile, and set his mug on the side table.

The Once-ler, conversely, had his mouth buried in the rim of his cup, wolfing down the sweet additions that Ted had no doubt outweighed any actual tea in his cup.

"Suit yourself!" He garbled, slurping in a way that made Ted stick out his tongue. He shook his head, trying to ignore the sounds of his eating, and turned his attention back to his grandmother.

"Why were you throwing tomatoes at him?"

"Oh, I only ever threw one. And it was Oncie who dared me to in the first place."

The Once-ler grumbled through his drink. "…Didn't think you'd actually take me up on it…"

Grammy rolled her eyes, but when she caught the confused look in Ted eyes, she continued. "You see Ted, everyone in town was doing it. He was still trying to sell his first Thneed, so he came out to the center of town, everyday, just begging people to stop by and here his pitch…"

"…I wasn't begging…" He sulked.

Grammy shot him a look. "I'm telling a story, dear, it's rude to interrupt."That made him perk up to attention, eyes wide with more than a little hint of fear."Anyway, the locals decided it'd be fun to start teasing the odd, lanky fellow with the guitar out wailing each day in the town center, and it just so happened that that same year, we took in a larger than usual tomato harvest. The town put two and two together, and tormenting Oncie practically became the town's new sport."

"I felt bad for the poor guy, and offered to help him get himself cleaned up one dayafter the townsfolk had been particularly generous with their pelting.I guess he was growing pretty sick of it by that point, because he snapped at me before I even got a word in. Shouting something about – 'Oh, you here to toss one at me too? Well what are you waiting for – get it over with!'"

"Well I was so angry at him for being angry that I didn't even stop to think. I did just what he'd told me, and threw one right in his face." She started laughing and rolled back into the couch.

The Once-ler narrowed his eyes, wiping at his mouth with his sleeve to smear away the marshmallow trappings caught by his beard. Ted spotted the smile he was trying to keep hidden while he was watching her.

"Alright, alright – I think that's enough story time for one day." He picked up the tray and piled it with their cups, even Ted's though he hadn't dared touch it. "I'm gonna get things cleaned up, and then I think we can call it a day. Not like there's much left to pack 'cept the bigger things anyway."

He started off towards the kitchen, accompanied by the subtle clinking of glass that Ted thought made the house sound oddly hollow when echoed. A creaking whine came from beside him, and he looked over to see Grammy leaning forward, watching him leave. When he was finally out of sight, she jumped off the coach and scurried towards the center of the room, her eyes darting wasn't entirely sure of it, but she seemed to be looking for something, tapping at parts of the floor with her cane.

"Grammy…? What're you-"

"Shhh – he'll hear you." She put a finger to her lips and jerked her head towards the kitchen. She seemed to relax a bit when the sound of running water came from that direction.

"He's hiding something – this can't be all he has here."

"W-what? You're kidding?" She shushed him, so that he lowered voice. "But…but there was so much stuff we carried out. At least ten boxes, all filled with his jun-…___belongings_."

She shook her head. "You may not believe that's all there is, but if I know the Once-ler, then what we went through today is nothing. We've barely scratched the surface." She continued her searching, listening careful to the sound produced by each tentative tap to the floor, quiet and careful, still fretful he'd overhear.

"He's a pack-rat alright," she continued, still tapping, "always has been, even back when I knew him. Never could stand to throw anything away. He always claimed he could make something out of it, or that he could still use it, or even fix it if it was already broken. I'd always thought it was just a man thing, my father had the same habit of hoarding all kinds of little trinkets when I was growing up, but Oncie took it to an extreme I'd never seen before. And he knows I won't let him bring it with him, too. That's why he's hiding his stash. I'm sure of it!"

A tap by the edge of the throw rug produced a ringing, hollow sound, that made her shoot up triumphantly with a quieted "aha!" Tossing a corner of the rug up, she leaned down to run her hand across the wood, grainy and paneled, but none the less nothing unusual about the particular spot. He heard her muttering to herself. "No…no of course not…he's too clever to put it out in the open like that…"

Her eyes shot up to Ted, and he jumped. "Look for something, anything that looks the bit out of place."

Though she jumped into action, touching anything within reach and frantically running her hands along the walls, Ted stayed put for another moment. His shoulders slumped in confusion. Out of place? What could she mean by out of place? There was barely anything left in the house! And even if there was, it's not like there was any more room in the car for whatever crap he had stowed away!

"Quick, Ted – before he gets back!" She furiously waved him off the coach.

Heeding her this time, he tossed his legs to the floor and scanned his eyes somewhat lazily around the room. "You know," he grumbled to himself, "it would make things a lot easier if I knew what I was looking for." He wasn't looking forward to more packing, the very thought made his legs feel like lead, so he was secretly hoping this was another one of Grammy's made-up stories she was always going on about. Well, then again her story about the Once-ler hadn't been made up….better not to think about that and just hope for the option that didn't include another few grueling hours of him being the only one strong enough to take boxes to the car.

He idled over to the center of the room, trying his best to look like he was earnestly searching. The ceiling fan cord hung in front of his face, and, checking first to see that Grammy was still occupied feeling up the walls, he reached up and pulled at it absently. The fan started turning. He pulled it again. It stopped.

He pulled it once more, and the floor heaved with a horribly loud lurching groan that shot Ted's heart down to the pits of his stomach.


	3. And yet it all comes rushing back

From behind him, Ted heard the sickening lurch of something heavy collapsing. His whole body tensed up, almost afraid too afraid to turn around.

Oh god what did I break, what did I break, what did I break...

"You found it Ted!" came the sound of Grammy's triumphant laugh as she clapped her hands together.

He turned to see her standing on the edge of the hole now inexplicably present in the middle of the floor. A paneled wood trap door, still swinging from force, hung above a narrow staircase into the basement below.

But what'd made the gut-wrenching sound Ted heard wasn't the door collapsing – it was an avalanche.

As if the parent monster of the eclectic collection he'd just finished packing away, below the opening lay its origins, a collapsed barrage of mis-matchings and itemized assortments receding further back then he could see. A scattering of knickknacks spilled out onto the base of the stairs, causalities of the door's opening.

Ted stumbled down the stairs, barely noticing when the Once-ler came rushing back in at the commotion.

Norma had her hands already in place on her hips, expecting him. He gave a glance, back and forth, quick, between her and the basement door, and slapped a surprised expression on his face.

"Oh...w-what's...what's that? H-How did that get there?" He gaped.

A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth, but she stayed quiet, offering him a chance to change his story. She challenged him with a raised brow.

Teetering on the edge of continuing for a moment, he finally slumped into a sigh, and knitted his brow, high on his forehead.

"Can you really blame me for trying?" He smiled weakly.

She only rolled her eyes towards the ceiling and laughingly shook her head, beginning to make her way down the stairs. He ducked in shortly after her, muttering quietly to himself "And here I'd sworn those marbles 'd thrown ya'll off the sent..."

With his long stride, he reached the bottom first and noticed Ted standing near the foot of the stairs staring out at his collection. He ambled the few feet towards him.

"Well Ted, don't you look excited to see my little man cave," he laughed. "I'll admit, I haven't stepped foot down here myself in quite a while now. Looks like the three of us will just have to find out what's all here, 'cause lord knows, I haven't kept track of it," he gave the boy a swift pat on his back, but with the weakness in his knees it almost made him fall forward.

"Ted?"

But Ted was too swept up in gaping at the room.

His heart sunk further as he scanned the room from one side, slowly finding the other.

"There's...there's not enough room in the car. T-there's not enough room in our house!" he stuttered, equal parts amazed and horrified at the collection Once-ler'd managed to pile up, even over a matter of decades.

"Oh dear, Oncie, I think you broke the poor boy." Norma piped up as she hopped down the last step with a little waddle. She walked over to her grandson and began to rub his back, cooing.

"I'm fine Grammy, I'm fine," that seemed to snap him back, and he shrugged away from her. He turned towards the Once-ler, critical disbelief in his voice. "What...how do you even have all this ju-...stuff!" He barely caught himself that time.

"It's really not as much as it seems! I...I think."

Norma cut him off, hooking her own arm around Ted's and giving it a swift pat. "There there, now, why don't you just go on home for the day? Like you said – it's not as if we can fit anything more in the car." She said, and led him to the stairs, still patting his arm reassuringly. When they reached the first step, he gave her a questioning look, and opened his mouth to protest (after all, it didn't sit right with him to leave them all on their own), but she only shook her head and pushed him up the first step.

"Don't you worry, dear, you just go right on home – maybe Audrey's back from her lessons by now, you could go see her. We can handle the rest here by ourselves," she called up as he ambled up the stairs, soon disappearing into the litted living room entrance, adding "We're going to throw most of this stuff in the trash anyway."

The Once-ler gulped, turning towards her. "We...we are?"

The room was much smaller once you got inside, or at the very least with Once-ler's piles of possessions heaped into mounds that filled out the corners, the illusion was created that you were in a very cramped space. If Norma had to guess, she would say it was about the size of his living room, but with only the one light bulb dangling near the center it was somewhat hard to tell where the long shadows ended.

Near the foot of the stair case, the floor was thick with objects thrown in scattered heaps, swept down through the opening hatch, no doubt, as soon as he was told Norma would be there to help.

Grammy immediately focused her keen eyes on the closest pile, and set to work, a steady determination in her movements. With the pace she was keeping, she was more assembly line than woman; she'd reel in an object towards her, study it for no more than a moment, and, in most cases, chuck it haphazardly towards the center, a few feet in front of the stairs – one of the only spaces with room enough to make another pile. She called out as she worked, muttering to herself little negatives with each object that reached her - "Nope, nope, nuh-uh, nope".

Caught at a loss, the Once-ler scrambled to halt the process. 'For god's sake, she was almost as old as he was - how on earth could she be this quick?', his thoughts flew with each trashed item he frantically jumped at to catch, trying to save it's fate. She wouldn't have any of his arguing, though, and simply thrust a finger towards the trash heap whenever he held them up to her scrutiny. At a loss, he fell into a grumbling silence, and resigned himself to simply walking amongst his trophies, rediscovering what he'd collected over the years. He occasionally tossed a stray strip of paper into the growing heap, or a broken object, so beyond repair he couldn't even identify it. Though those were the few exceptions.

He moved about the piles with an air of mild curiosity and disinterest, touching things, almost as if to say goodbye, all the while a nagging desire to stop her eating away behind his thoughts.

He seemed slightly ill at ease as well, Grammy noted, but ignored the thought and continued her work, attributing it to his hoarding.

Without realizing it, the two quickly grew out of sight of one another.

Norma could hear the reverberating sound of her own footsteps, cool and quiet, as she made her way further into the room, shuffling past the piles which seemed to get shorter as she went on. The dust breathed heavy in the air back here, painted on thicker and thicker the further she got from warm light echoing down from the living room.

The air back here hung over her, stale and stuffy, cut through with slices of light coming through the boards above.

She found herself stopping, distracted when she took a good look at her surroundings. A whiff of familiarity she couldn't place hung in the objects around her. Nostalgia...yes, it had to be nostalgia. The feeling was worming its way through her thoughts. But from what – she scratched absently beneath her ear, and looked around.

By the wall, crisp, rough curtains, ornately decorated with heavy pull cords lay crumpled in a heap. Maybe it was that pattern, sickly pale green stripes on a verdant background, that she'd come across before? Partly right...she could feel it eating away, as if the answer were just around the corner of her thoughts . She cast her eyes in the other direction. Paintings, at least half a dozen and each as high as the ceiling, stacked one on top of the other. She shuffled over to catch a glimpse of their subject – truffala trees. The colors were faded and bland, but there was no mistaking it. These were truffala trees. She marveled at them, swept in a wave of nostalgia entirely unrelated. She hadn't seen one full grown like this, not even in pictures, since...since...well, since the day the last one fell and crushed more than the ground beneath it.

She felt the impulse to run back upstairs and sniff at the air, just to smell the hint of butterfly milk already back from the sprouts.

She shook her head, bringing herself back to focus. Her eyes glided over the rest of the area, until her attention snagged on a desk not a few feet in front of her – caught by the sight of an old rotary phone, dust positively caked in its divots.

Her head fell slowly to the side. She'd seen it before. It was...she was certain that it his. Well, everything down here was really, but...

She turned back to check if he'd seen, but he was busy picking at the cogs of an open face grand-father clock, smiling innocently, watching them jerk back into place. She whipped back around, and realized her fingertips had already strayed to feel the receiver.

It used to be in his office, she whispered, the answer opening its branches with a flourishing stretch in her mind.

All of this is from his factory...

She felt herself walking a few steps further. She jumped back in alarm when she realized a pair of eyes were on her.

They were the Once-ler's, but not the one she'd seen smiling behind her. No, the eyes staring at her were much younger, a vestige, propped up and trimmed in that green suit he always did think made him look older. The picture was framed in aging glass that splintered right across his face. He was pointing at her with that larger-than-life caption "Too Big To Fail" etched in big letters along the bottom.

She gulped, transfixed by the photograph. In his eyes was that...fire, she all too easily recalled. Others called it ruthlessness, back when it still burned brightly, but no – no she knew better. The Once-ler she knew - or at least, her shoulders slumped, the Once-ler she thought she'd known - hadn't a ruthless bone in his body. The light behind his eyes was determination, a certain non-hesitance that comes from being absorbed completely in your waking dream. A non-hesitance that consumed him for a few years of his life, and only a few years. It was gone by the next time she'd seen him.

By the time she'd seen him again, years later and silhouetted behind a boarded up window, he was already a broken man.

The urge to go up and glide her hand along the image cast over her thoughts, but she clenched her fists and stopped herself. She started to turn away, but was stopped once more by a sight that cut her much more deeply than any of the others.

A single top hat, once black, now nearly gray and falling in on itself, its brim wrapped snug with an official-looking green band, rested softly on a stack of old books.

She must have made a sound, because she heard the quiet patter of approaching footsteps.

She moved towards the hat, picking it up without even bothering to turn her head towards him. "You kept this..." the words fell from her tongue before she even knew what she was saying. She heard him stop, and half say something in response, but his voice fell into silence.

"You kept all this..." she whispered, motioning all around her until she finally brought her eyes up to see him. A dull ache pulsed softly behind his eyes, one that made her heart clench up on its own. He nodded, but still didn't say anything.

"Did you..did you put all this down here on purpose?" She finally asked.

He sighed, letting his gaze fall to the hat still in her hands, and nodded again.

"You have to understand, Norma, it's been so long since I've been down here. Years...maybe even decades. I'd almost forgotten all this was even here...if I _had_ remembered, you can bet ya I certainly would've chosen a more appropriate hiding place," he gave a weak laugh, but his voice sounded tired, his words dripping out slow and steady.

"Once the factory started to close down, it just - everything was happening so quickly, with the smog chasing everyone out and the workers all leaving...I couldn't stand to see it all disappear. It was like letting other people take my history away. After everything that happened, with the Lorax leaving and...and the trees, all of them gone, I think I was afraid of forgetting more than anything else. More than my family leaving, more than..." his voice cracked; he still wasn't looking at her. "More than you leaving. So I kept it all to remind myself...at least – that was the idea."

"It wasn't long before I realized I couldn't stand to look at it. I...I wasn't strong enough to see the evidence of what I'd done, every single day. So I tucked it away down here, preserved it, so that at the back of my mind I always knew it was there. I knew I could shut out the outside, but not what's in here."

"The Lorax said he didn't wanna see me wallowing in my guilt anymore...I wonder how much of what he said was true. I wonder..." his voice dropped even lower. "I wonder how much of his wish I deserve."

A tight smile tugged at his lips, his eyes glazing over. He kept his gaze trained on the hat in her hands, refusing to look at her; or maybe, as with these remnants, he simply wasn't strong enough to. She heard him give a little "Hhmph" but didn't continue.

Norma choked back the tidal wave of things she wanted to say, words she knew could assuage his guilt, maybe coddle him with phrases about how it wasn't his fault.

But they both knew that'd do nothing to help now.

So she cut those feelings right off at the source, and straightened her back, marked with the same determination she carried with her most everywhere she went.

"You've suffered more in your lifetime than most people have, Oncie. You deserve the second chance you've been given. Just be happy you realized it before it was too late." Her voice rang out, almost cold, but it was the only way she could keep it from cracking.

"Yeah, but-"

"Nope, nuh-uh. I'm not sitting on my laurels watching you throw yourself a pity party. I'm sure you did that enough before Ted came and visited you, and now that you have all of us back in your life, particularly me, that kind of behavior isn't tolerated anymore." She huffed and moved to drop his hat back down, but stopped when she caught sight of the cover of one of the books beneath where'd it been.

Though dust caked its surface, she could just make out the flowering insignias – daisies, her favorite, winding around to frame the cover. It was faded yellow and white, with a cut out place for a picture on the front.

A photo album, she smiled, laying the hat to one side. Her and Oncie's first...and only, her face fell at the dampening thought, but she shook it off.

"Oh my...Oncie - look what I found!"

She hefted the thing into her arms, barely noticing when dust tumbled from its face and spilled down in all directions, including onto her blouse.

The corners of his lips perked up into a smile, and he shook his head, chuckling, at the thin layer of gray now adorning her outfit.

She looked confused for a moment, wondering why he didn't share her excitement, but, finally glancing down, joined him in laughing while she swept at the dust on her.

"I can't believe you kept this ol' thing."

"I can't believe it's still in one piece..."

"Well, come on – let's open it!" She was already on the move, making it apparent she was finished with the previous conversation.

He only shook his head and followed. She was quick too, plucking up two cushions and laying them, side by side, next to the wall. She plopped down onto one, the album on her lap, and gave a quick tap to the one beside her, signaling him over. He obliged, but had to hold onto the side of his old desk to lower his limbs that far down to the ground. He finally creaked into a collapse, a sigh echoing out with the plume of dust he produced.

"Now don't blame me if I can't get up after this. It was your idea to send the youngster away."

"Hush," she scolded, playing at a serious look on her face.

Scooting closer to him, so that there heads were nearly touching, she cracked open the first page.

If the man and woman in the picture there didn't look 50 years younger than them, she'd of sworn the thing was a mirror.


End file.
